“I’ll buy you bras instead of pickled eggs
Chocolate instead of chutney
Good red wine instead of bad red wine
Next time I remember your birthday
I love you like a madman
I miss you all the time
I wait for the morning
I will wait all night”
There are different kinds of love.
I love my folks.
I love my brothers, even when I’m stubborn and grumpy…and sometimes when they are.
I love Tuna, our cat, between 7.00am and midnight. I am not fond of her at all at any other time.
I love Tayto cheese and onion crisps, but am having an affair with Keogh’s cheese and onion.
I love running. But I love having run more.
I love making cards.
I love adventures.
I love making my kids laugh, and I sometimes love them even when they are not laughing.
I love Rossmore Park.
I love buying tee shirts, especially band merch.
I love hearing a good tune for the very first time.
I love hearing an old tune that I haven’t heard in a while and remembering exactly how I felt when I heard it the first time.
I love making art.
I love others’ art.
I love our house.
I love our neighbours, especially Molly.
I love telling my nieces and nephews amazingly true and accurate stories, and as they grow older I love the eye roll I get from them, and the hint of a smile.
I love cooking dinner.
I love candles…regular ones, not smelly ones.
I love a decent cup of tea.
I love getting lost in a book.
I love the salty air of the seaside.
I love my old classmates.
I love live music.
I love my friends.
I love friends from different elements of my life meeting and becoming friends themselves.
I love going out out.
I love hugs. I am not particularly fussy in my hugging, but I do look forward to a hug from Mrs.Connolly on a Saturday at Parkrun.
I love Parkrun.
I love lighting a fire…and falling asleep in front of it.
I love that I’m surrounded by amazingly creative people.
I love meeting people for a coffee.
I love writing.
I love Jake’s writing more.
I love meeting Freddie for lunch on a Wednesday.
I love having the next race to look forward to … Crocus 5k, Killarney Half, Bob & Bert’s 10k
I love having the next gig to look forward to. Colin Meloy, The Flaming Lips, Lucy Dacus, Black Country New Road, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah…
I love my evil Goddottirzzz.
I love Monaghan Town Runners.
I love Ten x 9.
I love Robyn’s enthusiasm for EVERYTHING !
I love The Drumlin Giants.
I love running with Ray.
I love smiling at people and the smile I get back.
I love the fat pigeons on Elm Row in Edinburgh.
I love that bits of St. Valentine are in Whitefriars Church , on Aungier St. in Dublin. And that other bits are in Madrid, Rome, Prague, the Slovakian cities of Kosice and Novaky, Chelno in Poland, Savona in Italy, the Greek island of Lesbos, Malta, Glasgow, Birmingham, and Vienna.
I love the Museum of Broken Relationships in Zagreb.
I love walking the Camino with my Soulmate.
I love walking half marathons in New York and Arosa with my Soulmate and the Good Glow crew. ( Don’t you mean running ? Yes, technically….)
I love the enthusiasm of a cover band.
I love not loving Country & Irish muzak.
I love when shopping in Flemings that you will always meet someone you haven’t seen in ages.
I love Rioja.
I love Pete Mohan.
I love witches, especially Patricia Zalewski.
I love the friends I’ve never actually met…and Stan.
I love my Soulmate’s laugh.
I love the scary little Warhammer things that Elliott makes.
I love Robyn’s enthusiasm for EVERYTHING !
And I love you.
None of the above are in order, except the order they occurred to me.
But I do love my Soulmate most of all.
Nothing else truly matters.
Love, and let yourself be loved.
Toodles,
Paul
P.S. This is ‘I Love You Like A Madman’ by Wave Pictures.
P.P.S. This is an old story :
When a relationship starts , or at any point during it, the simple, fun, romantic and non-threatening gifts of choice are flowers, chocolates and……well, flowers and chocolates basically. But at another point the seemingly ‘natural’ progression is that the male buys the female lingerie for St. Valentine’s Day. This is a relatively easy process these days with even Lidl getting in on the act, selling delightful lacy teddies for €8.99 beside their frozen whole lobster (€9.99 ) and their ‘I can’t believe it’s not Kellogs’ Quornflakes (€1.99). Today buying lingerie is a relatively anonymous affair.
This was not the case in Monaghan, or anywhere else in Ireland , in the late 80’s and early 90’s. I distinctly remember St.Valentine’s Day in 1994, the year Gossard launched the push up Wonderbra and you could not, and didn’t want to, avoid the famous ‘Hello Boys’ adverts featuring Eva Herzigova. These ads were so ubiquitous that they even made the front window of Charlie McNally’s shop in The Diamond, Monaghan.
This was a cruel twist of fate. The thought of buying lingerie, in Monaghan, was intimidating enough but the fact that the lingerie department in Charlie McNally’s was ‘policed’ by Mrs.McNally herself, who played golf with your mother……and your future mother-in-law…. made it doubly so.
Charlie McNallys was not an option.
Thankfully Dublin and anonymity were only a £5 return ticket away on Pat Joe McConnon’s bus. The bus pulled up on O’Connell St. beside The Gresham at 10.15am on a Saturday and the first stop was always Burger King. Up until 1996 there were two Burger Kings and three McDonalds in the whole island of Ireland and they were all in Dublin.
So, fed and watered by the good people of Burger King I steeled myself for the journey ahead, to the Stephen’s Green Shopping Centre and Ireland’s one and only Knickerbox. I’d heard of Knickerbox from my friends, the two Fintans ( Hamill and O’Donnell ) who were always more worldly, and allegedly, wise than I was.
And so I trudged past Clery’s department store with a whole window of Eva and her push ups, over the bridge, round Trinity and past Switzers and Brown Thomas department stores, both with heart shaped windows and , not only WonderBra’s, but whole ranges of corsets , bodices and what looked like bridles…but I couldn’t be sure ….on I soldiered to the top of Grafton St and the Green.
I was in such a hurry that I actually walked past the entrance to Knickerbox and had to double back. I stood, agog, staring at a forest of pink, shiny and flowery things. I needed another coffee. I had two more coffees.
I walked into the shop and blushed immediately. There were three girls working in the shop and one other customer, a brazen lady who was holding various accoutrements against herself as she swayed gently in front of the mirror. I was transfixed.
“Can I help you at all ?” a voice behind me asked.
I nearly fainted, I went an even brighter shade of pink and stammered “Just looking….” to which she smiled and nodding in the direction of the lady in front of the mirror replied “I can see that”. She went back to the counter and obviously motioned something hilarious to her co-workers as they both laughed out loud. I was tempted to turn and flee and spend my money in an honest to god regular shop like Golden Discs…….but I was on a holy mission, a noble quest , a rite of passage….
I continued to roam around the shop , looking at my feet, not touching anything, and avoiding the lady in front of the mirror and all the staff.
Eventually I must have hovered in front of a particular rail long enough for the same member of staff to approach again and offer assistance. “ I’d like this set please “ I said with a certain degree of conviction motioning towards , what I thought was a lovely , flowery, shiny bra and knicker combo. “Seriously ?” she replied “ are you buying these for your girlfriend or your sister ?”
“I don’t have a sister”
“Obviously.” she smiled “These would be a suitable present for an old aunty or perhaps if there’s a nun in the family. I’d recommend these instead.” She motioned to a set of plain black silky set of what I later found out to be French knickers and bra. “Don’t they come in other colours ?”
“Yes, but you, and more importantly the poor girl, don’t want any other colour.”
“OK, I’ll take them” I said. We now faced the next horrific hurdle.
“What size is she ?”
I started to make the international mime for “ I’m a tiger” and she recoiled in horror saying “Whoa there Casanova ! You can just tell me if she’s bigger or smaller than I am.”
“Smaller” I whispered.
We made our way to the till. “Would like them gift wrapped ?” she asked, “Yes please” I replied hurriedly in a whisper. My will had been crushed by this experience and I just wanted to go home.
She proceeded to wrap the dainty little things, which laid flat and neatly folded would fit in a standard envelope, in enough pink tissue paper to make even a Kardashian say “That’s excessive”, and then place the whole thing in a box big enough to contain a child’s three wheeled bike. This , in turn was placed in a tent shaped bag emblazoned with ‘Knickerbox’ in foot high silver script.
The lady handed me the bag, took my money and , through teeth she had to clench to avoid laughing in my face, she mumbled ‘Good Luck ‘ . I took the bag and as I turned to leave I’m sure I heard her say “ God help her”.
In my hurry to complete my mission I hadn’t factored in what I was going to do now with this enormous parcel for the rest of the day. It was now noon and McConnon’s first bus back didn’t leave from Parnell Square until 5.15 pm. I decided to go for lunch in Murphy Doodles , bought a copy of The Phoenix magazine and made my lasagne last for a good hour before making my way back out into the rain. I got back across the bridge and went into Eason’s to get a card. They were all spectacularly hideous. I bought a packet of blank cards and a packet of markers and decided to make my own.
It was now teeming rain and I was concerned of the effect it would have on my large , flimsy cardboard box and the Kardashian quantity of pink tissue paper inside. I headed up to Parnell Square on the off chance that the bus would be there early. It was. The driver was asleep inside , I knocked on the door and he opened it, the box would just about fit in. Safe at last!
I sat the parcel safely beside me, taking up a whole seat on its own, and I threw my anorak over it, both to protect it and more importantly , hide it. I diligently set to work with my markers making a card. I was so engrossed in this that I hardly noticed the bus fill up. Eventually all the seats were filled , but I hadn’t had to move my parcel. And then , just as the bus was about to pull off, she climbed aboard…..Mrs.McNally. She made her way down the bus , smiling and nodding to people she knew…she knew everyone….before stopping in the aisle beside me and the only seat not occupied by a person. “Hello Paul” she said smiling.”Mrs.McNally” I replied as I went to slide over, lifting the parcel on to my knee so that she had room to sit down. The anorak slipped. She stopped for a half second, half in the aisle, half sitting, staring at my giant “KNICKERBOX” bag.
She sat down and I hurriedly covered up the parcel again.
She smiled “Did you get yourself anything nice ?”.
“Yes, they had a special offer on socks….I bought the lot.”
She laughed.
We eventually made it home and I somehow managed to get the present and card to my Soulmate without any further interference.
On Valentines’ night we went for dinner in Andy’s Restaurant and by the time the main course was finished there had been no mention of the ‘present’. I couldn’t wait any longer. “What did you think of your present ?”
She leaned across the table took my hand in hers , held my gaze lovingly and said “I absolutely love the card.”
“And what about…..”
She squeezed my hand a little too hard “ I absolutely loved the CARD.”
“So you’re not actually wear…….” I yelped as she crushed my hand.
“Loved the CARD.”
